Qantas' brand value drops below $1b

THE value of the Qantas brand has dropped below the $1 billion mark, most likely affected by customer loyalty after its decision to ground planes during strike action last year.

MLC, Harvey Norman and David Jones have also shed millions from their brands.

And Woolworths has cause for celebration and concern after maintaining its position as Australia's most valuable brand at $7.1 billion, despite losing $504 million.

But the latest 2012 Brand Finance Australia report does have good news too with Coles, ANZ and Telstra on the right track; each adding more than $200 million in value.

Brand Finance Australia director Tim Heberden said the economic contribution of brands was reflected in the $51 billion aggregate value of Australia's top 30 brands.

"Despite the difficult economic conditions, Australia's top brands only lost 1% of their value in the last year, but there are clear winners and losers," he said.

"The value of the Qantas brand continues to fall, although the drop of $108 million represents a slowing rate of decline.

"Harvey Norman and David Jones both lost over 20% of their brand value.

"Yet Bunnings and Target showed that it is possible for retail brands to achieve robust growth in the current environment.

"The Telstra brand has performed extremely well, remaining in second position and generating additional value of $294 million."

Brand Finance comes up with values by assessing the strength, risk and future potential of the brand relative to its competitor.

Mr Heberden said Brand Finance had compared the value-adding performance of top Aussie brands against global benchmarks and found there was plenty of room to improve.

"It's no surprise that Apple tops Brand Finance's global brand study, but it is astonishing that Apple's value of US$71 billion is 1.4 times the combined value of our top 30," he said.

"With a small local market we have to ensure that Australian brand managers have the capability to develop brands that prosper in international markets."

The report also noted Victoria Bitter had dropped out of the top 30 since a foreign-owned company acquired it and American food giant Kraft had taken the value of iconic brand Vegemite away.

"The current trend is for our iconic brands to be acquired by foreign-owned companies," it read.

"Other brands that are no longer owned by Australian listed companies include Berri, Holden, James Boag's, Quiksilver, Tooheys, Pura and XXXX.

"We think it is important that Australian companies create strong brands and maintain ownership of these assets.
"It's partly a matter of economics, and also maintaining control over things that are dear to us."